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Reconstruction and its Relations to the Business of the Country. 
AN ADDRESS 

BY 

HON. GEORGE S. BOUTWELL, 

BEFORE 

THE OLD BAY STATE ASSOCIATION, 

BOSTON, DECEMBER 27, 1866. 



Ladies and Gentlemen : I trust no one will 
suppose that my subject implies any want of 
confidence in the patriotism of the business 
men of Boston, of our State, or of the country. 
I chose to speak upon the topic which has 
been announced, because I had observed occa- 
sionally in the public journals the suggestion 
that the business men of the country were 
largely interested in the immediate restora- 
tion of the Union, without much regard to the 
manner of doing the work. For myself, I have 
never accepted the suggestion, certainly not 
since the manifestations of patriotism during 
the war on the part of the business men of 
our State and of the country, that they would 
as a body be disposed to second any move- 
ment for the restoration of the Union not 
based upon sound principles of public policy. 
The restoration of the Union means the intro- 
duction again into the Government of the 
country of that considerable body of people 
and that vast extent of territory engaged in 
and covered by the rebellion. It implies a 
renewal of the exercise of power in this Gov- 
ernment by those men who for thirty years 
plotted for its overthrow, and for five years 
carried on a persistent and formidable, and at 
times apparently successful, rebellion for its de- 
struction. It is therefore no slight matter that 
these people at any time, or to any extent, until 
their spirit and purposes are changed, are to 
be received into the Government of the country. 
We accept, unquestionably, as far as the per- 
sons who have been concerned in the rebellion 
are to be considered, a body of men who are 
hostile to this Government, who seek its de- 
struction, and who will avail themselves of 
any opportunity that may present itself in the 
changing condition of public affairs to accom- 
plish that which they most desire. Therefore 
there should be on the part of all, accompanied 
with the desire for the restoration of the Union, 
attention to all those safeguards and securities 
which, under the circumstances, it is possible 
for us either to erect or to take. 



Again, consider that the restoration of the 
Union implies the renewal of power on the 
part of nearly four million people who, for the 
present moment, are excluded from all partici- 
pation in the Government of the country. It 
implies, also, the exercise of power on the part 
of their posterity and successors through many 
generations ; and if we accept them as they 
are, with supreme power in their respective 
localities and States vested in the hands of 
rebels, with all the institutions which control 
and mould public sentiment subject to their 
will, we cannot expect that in five or ten or 
twenty or fifty years even, the spirit of rebel- 
lion will be extinguished in that section of 
country. In the ten States that are not rep- 
resented in the Congress of the United States 
there were, in 1860, 4,620,000 white people ; 
there were at that time 125,000 free colored 
persons; there were also 3,265,000 slaves, 
making an aggregate of colored persons of 
3,390,000, against 4,620,000 white persgns. 
These ten States have an area of 635,454 square 
miles — about one fifth of the entire surface of 
the Union, including all the Territories that 
are but partially settled this side of the Rocky 
mountains, and the vast mountain region be- 
tween the Mississippi river and the Pacific 
ocean. These ten States have a population at 
present of rather more than eight million ; 
they have an area of 635,000 square miles ; 
they have, for the most part, a fertile soil ; 
they are blessed with a salubrious and agree- 
able climate; they possess all the natural 
advantages which insure in the future a vast 
population. It is therefore a matter of the 
highest magnitude to so arrange the details of 
reconstruction and to proceed upon such prin- 
ciples as shall secure to the country a loyal 
public sentiment in all that region. If we 
leave to these four million rebels local power, 
undiminished sway in one fifth of the terri- 
tory of the Union ; if we confide to them and 
to their care the institutions of government, 
of education, of religion, of social life ; if we 






*"] *■? 



assign to them the undisputed control of the 
3, what have we to expect in the future 
except generation after generation influenced 
he same principles and animated by the 
same purposes that have controlled the inhab- 
it am s of that region for the last thirty-five 
years ? These facts and views give us some 
idea of the magnitude of the subject with which 
we are to deal. 

For the purpose of showing how the business 
interests of this country are concerned in the 
work of restoration, I desire to recall your at- 
tention to certain well-known facts, developed 
by the census of I860, but indicated quite 
distinctly in all the censuses that have been 
taken from 1790 until 1860, showing how the 
system of slavery has tended to prevent the 
increase of the population of this vast and in- 
viting region of country, and how also it has 
contributed to depress labor, to degrade the 
laborer, and consequently to render that sec- 
tion incapable of producing wealth, as com- 
pared with the free States of the country. 
These facts are well known ; but in the rela- 
tion in which I speak to-night 1 think it not 
unwise to recall your attention to them. The 
area of New England, New York, Ohio, Penn- 
sylvania, New Jersey, Maryland, and Delaware 
— a vast region of country — is but 213,786 
square miles — just about one third the area of 
country covered by the ten unrepresented States. 
But these twelve States, with an area of but 
218,060 square miles, against 685,000 square 
miles in the ten rebellious States, have a popu- 
lation of 13,682,000 against 8,010,000 in those 
ten States, nearly half of w T hom are colored 
people, showing how much more rapidly popu- 
lation has increased in the free States than in 
the slave States. In these twelve free States 
the population averages sixty-three persons to 
the square mile, while in the ten rebellious 
an|i unrepresented States the population is but 
twelve and six tenths persons to the Square mile : 
that is, the average population in the twelve 
free States is about live times as large as in the 
ten unrepresented States. If these ten rebel 
States, in proportion to their area, had an equal 
population with the twelve free States, they 
would number forty million people. That they 
have not the population is undoubtedly due, 
in a large degree (not entirely) to the insti- 
tution of slavery. 

Next, it may be well to consider how it is 
that slavery has prevented the increase of popu- 
lation in this inviting region of country. First, 
unquestionably slavery, as a system of oppres- 
sion, prevents the increase of population ; it 
deters those seeking a home from migrating 
into a region of country that is controlled by 
the institution. In the second place, where 
.- Lavefy exists there must prevail among 
the people generally a system* of ignorance 
from which they cannot escape. It is un- 
doubtedly true that the people may be in some 
degree ignorant oven where they are free, be- 
cause it is only by a certain amount of educa- 



tion, acquaintance with the world, experience, 
knowledge of history, that a man comes to 
realize the importance of education as a means 
of prosperity. But wherever the institution of 
slavery exists, wherever the mass of the people 
are denied their natural rights, there, of course, 
the laboring population are in a state of ignor- 
ance, because the controlling interests of soci- 
ety are opposed to every system of education. 
In Great Britain, for example, the interest in 
education is limited to those classes that are to 
participate in the Government. I have often 
said that even in our own State of Massachu- 
setts, where public instruction has existed for 
about two hundred years, and where there is a 
strong public sentiment in favor of its contin- 
uance, if we were to introduce a system by 
which the laboring people should be deprived 
of their natural rights, and especially if they 
were debarred the exercise of the elective 
franchise, our system of education would not 
last thirty years. It is because the mass of 
the people feel that a system of public in- 
struction is the chief means by which they and 
theirs are to be elevated from a condition of 
poverty to affluence, from ignorance to culti- 
vation and refinement,' that always and every- 
where they support schools and institutions of 
learning. Therefore, wherever slavery exists 
there must be ignorance, and so wherever 
slavery exists there must be a great degree of 
insecurity, not simply to the slaves themselves, 
but to every race and every condition of so- 
ciety. The system of slavery being in itself a 
despotism, and the system of African slavery 
in this country having proved the truth that 
every slaveholder was a petty tyrant, life, lib- 
erty, and property have always been insecure 
wherever the system has existed among us. 

We have destroyed the institution of slavery 
as a chattel system in the southern States, al- 
though to the dishonor of the Government it 
must be confessed that in several of those 
States efforts are making to reestablish some- 
thing like the institution of slavery. What we 
need now is air Executive who shall use the 
national authority for the protection of the 
colored and white loyal people in the States 
recently in rebellion. W e have destroyed the 
system of slavery in these fifteen States ; but 
we have not destroyed the spirit of slavery ; 
and if by any plan of restoration you put local 
power into the hands of the slaveholding 
classes ; if you give to them the control of 
those States ; if you give to them the exclu- 
sive right to be represented in the Congress 
of the United States, in some form and in 
some way they will devise means for the con- 
tinued oppression of the class recently in ser- 
vitude. Therefore it is the duty of the Gov- 
ernment and of the people, in considering the 
subject of restoration, not to allow the mind 
to be diverted at all from the necessity of 
our condition, which is to so reconstruct this 
Government that oppression shall cease, that 
ignorance shall be removed, and that there 



shall be security for life, liberty, and property 
in all that region of country. 

There have been suggested, during the last 
two years, four different ways of restoring the 
Union. I call them ways ; some of them are 
poor ways. The first is the President's way, 
which upon the views I have been presenting 
is really no way at all for the people of this 
country. It is a way which opens to the South, 
to the rebel States and to the rebel leaders, a 
renewal of power in the Government and con- 
signs all this vast territory and these eight 
million people to their undisputed control. 
I trust that the loyal citizens of this country 
with great unanimity are opposed to this way ; 
and they should be opposed to it as well for 
its origin as for its results. It is a simple 
way. The President wishes to invite these 
ten States back into the Union ; to give them 
for the present the representative power which 
they had under the old Constitution ; repre- 
sentation based upon three' fifths of the old 
slave population, and after the census of 1870 
representation to be based upon the entire ne- 
gro population of the South, while the negroes 
are to be excluded from all participation in the 
government of the country. But the Presi- 
dent's way is equally objectionable on account 
of its origin. _/Vou remember very well the 
proclamation concerning North Carolina, issued 
in May or June, 1865. It was the beginning 
of a system of usurpation, which to-day in its 
results is the chief obstacle to the speedy and 
safe restoration of the Government. He as- 
sumed in that proclamation power which neither 
he nor any President since the beginning of 
the Government had a right to exercise under 
the Constitution. His premise for the procla- 
mation was the fourth section of the fourth arti- 
cle of the Constitution, which declares that the 
United States shall guaranty to every State in 
this Union a republican form of government. 
After various other non-essential statements, he 
deduces his conclusions, and proclaims a gov- 
ernment in North Carolina, assuming that he 
was, as the United States, carrying out this pro- 
vision of the Constitution. 

There were two difficulties in the way of 
his theory. First, he was not the United 
States : and secondly, the Supreme Court had 
declared that it ..was .Congress, and Congress 
only, which could decide whether the govern- 
ment of a State was republican or not. In the 
case of Luther vs. Borden the Supreme Court, 
ypu remember, held that it was for Congress to 
decide whether the constitution of a State was 
republican, and that every department of the 
Government of the United States was bound 
thereby. But the President assumed to be the 
United States, to erect a government in the 
State of North Carolina, and to take upoii him- 
self authority to decide that question which could 
be decided only by Congress. That was the 
beginning of our difficulties with reference to 
reconstruction. Then the President departed 
still further. If I am not in error, Mr. Lincoln, 



during his administration, was very careful, in 
the provisional governments which he estab- 
lished or authorized, to act exclusively in his 
capacity as Commander-in-Chief of the Army, 
and not at all as President, clothed with civil 
authority. And further, he either appointed 
an officer of the Army to be the provisional or 
military governor of a State, or if civilians 
were appointed, they received commissions in 
the military service. But Mr. Johnson acted 
differently, and not only did not proceed in the 
reconstruction of this Government as Com- 
mander-in-Chief of the Army, but he exercised 
authority merely in his civil capacity. He not 
only did not go to the Army of the United 
States ; he not only did not go exclusively 
among the loyal people of the country, but he 
pardoned rebels, exercising therein a high 
function which he could exercise only as Pres- 
ident of the United States; restoring to their 
civil rights men who had participated in the 
rebellion, and then appointing them Govern- 
ors of these various States or districts of coun- 
try. I think the nation has already reached 
the conclusion, that whether we look to the 
grounds on which these governments are estab- 
lished or to the results that are likely to flow 
from them, they are to be regarded as uncon- 
stitutional and invalid organizations. 

Another plan of restoring the Union is to 
admit these ten States respectively whenever 
they shall ratify severally the pending amend- 
ment to the Constitution of the United States. 
The character of this amendment I need not 
detail to you. I may say that on the very day, 
I think, that the House of Representatives 
voted to admit Tennessee to her place as a 
State in the Union, a bill was laid on the 
table which declared that whenever any one 
of the States recently in rebellion should 
ratify the constitutional amendment it should 
be admitted to representation in the govern- 
ment of the country. The constitutional amend- 
ment, as far as understood lyy the radical men 
in the Congress of the United States, meant 
just this, and nothing more : that it was a con- 
dition-precedent to the recognition of the right 
of those States to be represented in the gov- 
ernment of the country ; a condition which we 
would not dispense with, but a condition which 
we were not bound to regard as the sole condi- 
tion. It was so treated at the time by many 
members of the House of Representatives. 
Finally, I am bound to declare that it would 
be in the highest degree unwise and unsafe for 
the people of this country to accept these States 
when the constitutional amendment shall be 
ratified by the country or by them respectively ; 
and the reasons are apparent. Like the Pres- 
ident's policy, the amend. uent turns over these 
ten States to the control of rebels. The amend- 
ment itself only by indirection obtains security 
for the recognition of the rights of the negroes. 
It will be practicable for the white people of 
the ten States to exclude the negroes from all 
voice in the government of them. They will 



lose eighteen of their present Representatives, 
but still, I have no doubt that on the whole the 
mass of the rebel leaders in the South will prefer 
the loss rather than the extension of the right of 
suffrage to negroes. They will still have their 
two Senators from each State, and an aggregate 
of seventy members in the House of Repre- 
sentatives ; they will still be a compact and 
powerful organization for the purposes of over- 
throwing the Government. 

As a matter of policy, setting aside the ques- 
tion of right, it will be unfortunate for the peo- 
ple of this country to admit any system of res- 
toration which allows the ten States to continue 
a unit in opinion with reference to the exist- 
ence of the Government. As a matter of policy 
we must divide the public sentiment of these 
States ; divide their local governments, placing 
some of them on the side of the Union ; se- 
curing representation by loyal men, even though 
those loyal representatives be black men. It 
is the most dangerous of all propositions that 
these old slave States should hereafter be rep- 
resented in the government of this country as a 
unit upon the question which is vital to us — 
whether the Government shall exist ; there- 
fore for one I look for such a policy in this 
work of restoration as will secure to the Gov- 
ernment of the United States 9, loyal support. 
If we cannot have the united force of the old 
fifteen slave States let us at least take a por- 
tion. If South Carolina has a majority of 
black people, I prefer that she should have 
loyal black rather than disloyal white repre- 
sentatives. And therefore I say secondly, that 
the constitutional amendment, right in itself 
and necessary as a condition-precedent to the 
restoration of the Union, is wholly insufficient 
as a final and complete measure of pacification ; 
and it is better for the country to reject it alto- 
gether and fight out the battle upon the plain 
issue of human rights, equal and exact justice 
to all men, than to accept this as a complete 
and final measure of restoration. 

There is a third proposition that the Union 
shall be restored, the constitutional amend- 
ment beingadopted, whenever these States shall 
inaugurate a system of impartial, restricted 
suffrage, whenever they shall be ready to de- 
clare that any man who can read the Constitu- 
tion of the United States, or write his own 
name, or who owns property of the value of 
$200, is entitled to the right of franchise — the 
law to apply to the black man and the white 
man alike. I regard this plan of restoration 
as delusive and dangerous in the highest de- 
gree. In Massachusetts, where there is a sys- 
tem of public instruction, where there are pub- 
lic schools that furnish as good an education 
as was afforded by Harvard College eighty 
years ago, we may with some degree of pro- 
priety say that no man shall be entitled to 
vote unless he can read and write ; for we 
place before him the means of knowledge. 
But are you to say this to the three million 
people who are, in those ten States, and who 



have been denied every opportunity and every 
means of acquiring education ; men, women, 
and children who are ignorant because it has 
been and is to-day, as far as the penalty of the 
law is concerned, a crime to teach them? When 
you erect schools by charity the enemies of 
freedom give them to the flames, and the south- 
ern horizon is lighted up by the fires of the 
burning houses that the North has erected for 
the education of freemen. When you have 
said that no person can vote in the ten States 
except on those conditions, you have offered 
an additional inducement to the rebels to pre- 
vent the education of the freedmen. If you 
consent to the reconstruction of this Govern- 
ment upon the basis that those only shall vote 
in the ten States who can read and write, you 
have excluded the whole negro population of 
the South from the ballot-box, and you have 
placed, perhaps for a century, power in the 
hands of the rebel slave-holding classes of 
that region of the country. I think this one 
objection alone is sufficient to condemn the 
proposition for impartial, restricted suffrage. 
I come then to what I believe offers the only 
safe way out of our present difficulties. The 
constitutional amendment recognizes all per- 
sons born in this country as citizens of the 
country ; but after all it is insufficient and un- 
trustworthy unless you add thereto universal 
suffrage in the ten States. I do not mean to 
say that I suppose that the extension of the 
elective franchise to the negro population of the 
South will at once remove all our difficulties-. 
I do not expect that there will be then every- 
where peace. I suppose there will be resistance 
on the part of the whites, and very likely there 
will be blood shed in some places and lives may 
be lost; but after a little excitement and some 
resistance, after a few struggles, the people of 
the South will come to the conclusion that they 
had better submit. Out of these four million 
white people of the South we may expect that a 
million will ally themselves with the Govern- 
ment. They will be willing to unite with the 
negro population of the South for the restora- 
tion of the State governments upon a loyal basis. 
And when we have secured this we may then 
consider that other question, which some per- 
sons desire to have considered before all other 
things in the matter of restoration : the question 
of amnesty to the rebels, either partial or uni- 
versal. I agree that not much time can pass 
after the restoi-ation of these States to the Union 
before the men who have participated in the re- 
bellion will be restored to their political rights. 
I expect it, and upon the whole I desire it; but 
what I seek most to guard against is the res* 
toration of the States that have been disloyal to 
the Union upon dangerous conditions. What is 
the aspect of public affairs in the. South to-day? 
What, are we to expect if the Government shall 
be restored upon an unjust basis ? It is humilia- 
ting to admit, but it is nevertheless true, that 
the South as a whole is in a more unpromising 
condition to-day than it was a year and a half 



since. It is not too much to say that through- 
out these ten States, from North Carolina to 
Texas, there is one grand carnival of all the 
spirits of disquiet, disorder, and bloodshed ; and 
I cannot refrain from the remark that this con- 
dition of things is due in a large measure to the 
course which Mr. Johnson has chosen to pur- 
sue. If he had refrained from issuing a proc- 
lamation of peace ; if he had been disposed to 
wield the great powers of the Government in 
the interest of loyalty and of the Union, it would 
have been in his hand to have maintained 
order and peace throughout that whole region 
of country. But what is their condition to-day ? 
The civil rights bill passed by Congress by a 
constitutional majority, notwithstanding the 
opposition of the President, is a dead letter. 
The Freedmen's Bureau bill is disregarded. 
Weekly I receive letters from officers of the 
Army, stationed throughout the South with small 
squads of men, in which they declare that they 
are powerless to serve the country and protect 
the loyal blacks or whites in that region. They 
are insulted by the rebels. The Army of the 
Republic, through themselves or representa- 
tives, is constantly insulted, its power disre- 
garded, and the authority of the Government 
everywhere contemned. We know, too, for 
the testimony is conclusive, that colored men, 
freemen, are murdered frequently ; not a sin- 
gle case, here and there, but by tens and hun- 
dreds ; and from Texas it is reported that even 
more than a thousand have been thus sacrificed. 
Throughout the whole South the black people 
are insecure in their lives, in their persons, and 
in their rights, and nowhere in that vast region 
of country is there any power to protect them. 
I know not in the history of nations a more 
melancholy example than that which this Gov- 
ernment exhibits to-day in the condition of the 
southern country. I say further, after most 
careful reflection, that I see no possible way 
out of these difficulties while the present Chief 
Magistrate is at the head of the Government. 
Congress is strong; it has received the sup- 
port of the people ; it has now a two-thirds 
majority in each House, to be increased in the 
Fortieth Congress, and it can pass whatever 
measures it prefers, notwithstanding the Presi- 
dent's veto. But after all it is helpless to 
execute; it has no hand by which it can wield 
or control the powers of this Government. 
Therefore I say that during the two years fol- 
lowing the 4th of next March, if Mr. Johnson 
continues to be President of the United States, 
no efficient steps can be taken for the restora- 
tion of the Government. Disorder will still be 
the rule in the South. To-day we know very 
well that citizens of the North who went South 
during the last twelve or eighteen months to 
develop the resources and apply their skill and 
industry to that country are preparing to aban- 
don it and to come away. There is little prob- 
ability that the next year will yield an amount 
of cotton equal to the product of the year 1866. 
I make no prediction as to what the future 



has in store for us with reference to the Presi- 
dent; but I only say that if he continues in 
office during the two years to come, I know 
of no means by which human life can be pro- 
tected, by which human rights shall be regarded 
as sacred, or by which any efficient means can 
be taken for the restoration of these ten States 
to their ancient place in the government of the 
country. We have, then, before us for these 
two years for the South, ignorance, poverty, 
and misrule. 

Further, the transfer of the government of 
that region of country to the rebels, to the 
slaveholders, means repudiation of all the 
public debts which those ten States owe. Vir- 
ginia is indebted $43,000,000, exclusive of 
what she incurred on account of the rebel- 
lion. Returning to the census of I860, we 
find that the average annual product in the 
free States was $131 for each person. In the 
slave States the annual product was $70 for 
each person, giving an excess in favor of 
the free States of $61. If you compare Mas- 
sachusetts, a good representative of the free 
States, with Maryland, the most prosperous of 
the old slave States, you will find that, exclu- 
sive of her returns for commerce in 1860, the 
annual product in Massachusetts was $235 for 
each person, and in Maryland only $96, aD 
excess, however, of nearly fifty percent, over the 
average of the South, but still giving a balance 
of $139 in favor of Massachusetts. And this 
balance, this excess, is due, not to any superior 
physical capacity on the part of the people of the 
North, not due to any superior intellectual or 
natural ability, but due simply to the fact that our 
people are educated, and to the consequent fact 
that here labor is honorable and respected. In 
the South the laboring population are ignorant, 
labor is considered dishonorable, and as a nat- 
ural consequence the laboring classes produce 
very little. The political economical problem 
to be worked out by the people of this country is 
to reestablish government in the South ; to 
restore, those States to the Union upon such a 
basis that the laboring people shall become edu- 
cated, and that it shall be honorable for any one 
tolabor. Thenyou will seetheproductivepower 
of the people of the South increase fifty or one 
hundred per cent. Therefore I say that it is of 
the highest importance to business men, not so 
much with reference to this year or the next 
two years— for I suppose business men will 
consider this matter in a broad view, and for a 
long period of time, for a period often, twenty, 
or fifty years — it is of inestimable importance 
to the business men of the country that the 
Government be reconstructed upon the right 
basis. 

Let us consider another fact. In those ten 
States there were, in the year 1860, eight mil- 
lion people. If yon can so educate those 
eight million people as that their abilities 
shall be applied to the work of production 
as efficiently as the people of the North apply 
their abilities, and the average should go 



6 



up from $70 for each person to $131, the 
average of the North, you add in a single year 
to the production of the South the sum of 
$487,946,000. A fifth of the entire public 
debt of the United States would be added to 
the resources of the country in a single year 
if you could give to the people of the South 
the productive power which is exhibited and 
enjoyed by the people of the North. 

The continuance of the existing state of 
things at .the South, or the restoration of the 
Union according to the President's way, or 
upon the mere ratification of the amendments 
to the Constitution, or upon the system of im- 
partial but restricted suffrage, means, then, repu- 
diation of the State debts. Does anybody sup- 
pose Virginia can pay a debt of $43,000,000 un- 
less she is regenerated, unless her people are 
able so to improve their powers of production as 
to augment the resources of that region far 
beyond its previous development? New Eng- 
land must be carried to Virginia and North 
Carolina; Ohio must be carried to Georgia and 
Alabama; New York must be carried to South 
Carolina, before the natural advantages of that 
country will be so developed as to enable the 
people to pay the debts they owe. And again, 
the restoration of this Government, with the 
South a unit against the Union, means repu- 
diation of the debt of the United States. I do 
not stop to dwell upon that. 

It is also to be observed that unless the South 
can be restored upon a basis such as I have 
indicated, there can be no resumption of spe- 
cie payments for a long period of time. One 
difficulty in reference to the resumption of spe- 
cie payments is this : that three, four, or five 
hundred million of our public securities are 
owned abroad. Whenever there is a panic on 
the other side of the Atlantic, as there was 
upon the opening of the late Continental war, 
and there is a demand for gold, these securi- 
ties will he worth more in our markets than 
they are in foreign markets, and they will be 
sent here in quantities of twenty-five, fifty, or 
a hundred million dollars, according to the 
necessities or the fears of the people on the 
other side, the proceeds drawn from our banks, 
if they should be paying specie, and the banks 
consequently would be compelled to .suspend. 
Therefore, one of the difficulties which we 
have to encounter, and which we must, look in 
the face while we have so large a public debt, 
a portion of which is owned abroad, is that, 
■"I- there is a panic in Europe there 
will be a demand upon the banks and upon 
the people of this country for specie. One of 
the benefits to b ■ derived from the restoration 
of order in the South is, that you apply the 
labor of that section of country to the produc- 
tion of those articles which are a substitute for 
specie. We produce grain in the West in vast 
quantities : but the condition of transportation 
between the West and the Atlantic coast is 
such that we cannot expect to export quanti- 
ties of grain sufficient to meet an exigency such 



as I have indicated. But if we can apply the 
labor of the South in the most productive way 
we can augment the quantity of cotton pro- 
duced from two to four, six, eight, or even to 
ten million bales, and supply Europe, supply 
indeed the whole world, with the kind of cot- 
ton which this country produces. Cotton is 
perhaps the nearest to specie of any product 
of the soil. When the southern country is cut 
up into small holdings, when the negro popu- 
lation shall be stimulated to produce cotton by 
the incentive which stimulates us all, personal 
pecuniary advantages;'' I doubt not we shall 
begin to realize what has been set forth by our 
friend Atkinson, that the South is capable of 
producing many million bales of cotton in ex- 
cess of any previous production. Cotton will 
be a substitute for specie, and in the nature of 
the case it is the chief means upon which we 
can rely to meet the balances abroad. Until 
the South is regenerated, until the labor of that 
section of country is wisely and profitably ap- 
plied to the production of cotton, it is a very 
grave question whether, in view of the large 
amount of our public debt owned abroad, the 
banks of this country can resume and maintain 
specie payments. 

In the next place, until there is a restoration 
of the Union upon sound principles, there must 
be a degree of weakness in the Government, 
which cannot by any means be overcome. If 
we have ten, twelve, or fourteen States known 
to be hostile to this Government, what is our 
condition for protecting our rights? I am not 
alarmed in regard to any attempt on the part of 
other Governments to interfere with the United 
States ; but it is a humiliation to every Amer- 
ican citizen that the country is in such a condi- 
tion that we cannot assert our rights under any 
circumstances and against all odds. Mr. John- 
son, as you have seen, has just sent two am- 
bassadors to Mexico. Laboring under the 
delusion that he has restored this Govern- 
ment to peace, order, and quiet, he thinks the 
time has come when he can interfere in Mexico 
and undertake to manage Maximilian, Juarez, 
and all the rest who are contending for suprem- 
acy in that distracted country. As far as Mr. 
Johnson is concerned, I think he had better not 
interfere in the affairs of other Governments 
until he has clearer evidence of his success in 
managing the affairs of his own country. 

I may be justified in an observation rather 
aside from my theme. The people' of this 
country will not hesitate to declare their rights 
in reference to the claims upon England 
for depredations by the Alabama and other 
piratical corsairs upon our commerce ; they 
will not hesitate to maintain the ancient tradi- 
tional doctrine of this country that it is an 
offense for any foreign nation to attempt by 
force or by external pressure to establish a 
monarchy upon this continent; they will not 
hesitate to declare their opinions upon every 
question concerning the rights of the people ; 
but I take it for granted that neither the Con- 



gress of the United States nor the people will 
intrust either Mr. Johnson or Mr. Seward with 
any power whatever to interfere in the affairs 
of Mexico, to press our claims for compensa- 
tion on Great Britain, or to offer any offense to 
the Emperor of the French. They know per- 
fectly well that we can delay all these questions 
until after the 4th of March, 1869 _; and then 
if we choose to interfere in the affairs of Mex- 
ico we may do it with the certainty that we 
shall have the power to execute what we 
undertake ; if we choose to demand compen- 
sation from Great Britain we. can do it with 
every reason to believe that she will concede 
whatever we shall consider right' and just. 
They also know that the French Emperor will 
withdraw his troops from Mexico long before 
the 4th of March, 1869 ; that it is not for us 
now to assert offensively any right we may have, 
however just it may be ; that in our strength 
we can afford to rest, confident that the time is 
not far distant when there will be an executive 
department of the Government representing 
the judgment and opinion and purpose of the 
people of this country, and an executive depart- 
ment disposed to execute this purpose under 
the Constitution and according to the laws of 
the land. The South itself will come soon to 
the opinion that those who demand universal 
suffrage and the restoration of the Government 
upon sound principles are, after all, its best 
friends. The South will soon discover that Mr. 
Johnson himself, whether intentionally or not, is 
in reality their worst enemy. No man has done 
more to injure the cause of the South than he. 
Of all things, the necessity of the southern 
people when the rebellion was overthrown was 
this: that the man in the presidential chair 
should enjoy the confidence of the loyal people 
of the country. Enjoying the confidence of the 
loyal people of the country he could have done 
those things in behalf of the South which were 
necessary for its prosperity and security ; but 
such is the popular impression now in regard to 
Mr. Johnson throughout the whole North, that 
he is utterly incapable of taking any step for the 
support of what are the just rights of the people 
of that section. Mr. Lincoln's death was as great 



a calamity to the South as to the North. They 
needed a man like Mr. Lincoln in the presi- 
dential chair, whose kind heart, guided by the 
principles of the Government, true always to 
justice, to the Union, and to the Constitution, 
would yet have melted in the presence of their 
distresses, and yielded from time to time that 
influence and support which in their depressed 
and^rostrate condition they so much needed. 
But by his death they were deprived of the be- 
nign influence of his administration, and the 
conduct of his successor led them to expect a 
restoration of the ancient order of things, when 
they controlled the policy of the United States. 
In that expectation they are to be disappointed ; 
but it has had this evil effect. They have un- 
dertaken to assume authority and to exercise 
power in their respective localities as though 
the ancient order of things had been restored 
already, and now the work of restoration upon 
sound principles is made more and more diffi- 
cult. But from what I know of the purpose 
and opinion of Congress I do not hesitate to 
say that the great majority of the loyal mem- 
bers of the two Houses are in favor of declaring, 
by solemn resolution or public act, that the 
governments set up in these ten States are ille- 
gal and invalid. It is their purpose also, by 
legislative authority, to establish governments 
in those districts — call them territorial gov- 
ernments, or what you will ; abd in the act es- 
tablishing those governments to decide that all 
loyal male citizens shall be entitled to the right 
of suffrage. 

I believe the time has come when we should 
cut clear of all theories and of all speculations 
concerning the rights of the people of that sec^ 
tion of the country, growing out of their ancient 
relations to the Government of the United 
States. It is our duty to establish institutions 
upon the fundamental pricinples of natural 
justice, beginning at the foundation, recogniz- 
ing the rights of men because they are men, 
and building up governments republican in 
form; and whether the time necessary for the 
consummation of this plan be one year or five 
years, or ten years we shall appeal to the people 
to maintain that policy unto the end. 



Printed at the Congressional Globe. 



